The American Society of Magical Negroes 2024
I got a chance to see a free screening of this movie through Focus Insiders. After I signed up, I read some reviews which were mostly mediocre. As this movie quickly points out, a "magical Negro" is a black character in a film with special powers that exists only to support the white main character. The example in this movie is The Green Mile. Soon we are introduced to a secret organization of black people who try to prevent white on black violence everywhere by detecting when white people are getting out of sorts and then putting them at ease so they don't go crazy and kill black people. It is kind of a ridiculous concept and it gets murkier as the movie wears on. At first it is kind of fun at first to see how it can be applied, but it too quickly tossed aside for a romance and there is a subplot with a dot com company. There are a few good ideas here. The main character is shy artist with no self-confidence, played by Justice Smith as a black version of Michael Cera: cringey, awkward, but somehow charming. He is recruited into the society by David Alan Grier who plays things mostly straight while explaining this crazy concept. The movie does have a few things to say about racial relations. While there is more urgency when it comes to interactions between black people and, say, white policemen, all societal interactions are a little awkward and require some compromise and at times self-effacing behavior to make others feel comfortable. So the movie ends up being a little simplistic, a little bit off, and has a hard time even sticking to its own message. Still, there are some decent observations, a funny initial concept, but it becomes more talky and less meaningful as it goes.
Written: 16 Mar 2024